Patients with advanced melanoma experience a high mortality rate (Balch et al. J Clin Oncol. 2009 Dec. 20; 27(36):6199-206). Currently, the standard method of treatment is early diagnosis followed by appropriate complete surgical excision. Additional treatments are available for high-risk patients, but accurate methods of identifying such patients are not currently available in the clinic (Bhatia et al. Oncology. 2009 23(6):488-96; Nashan et al. J Eur Acad Dermatol Venereol. 2007 21(10):1305-18; and Nathanson K L. Biochemical pharmacology. 2010 80(5):755-61).
Improved diagnostic and prognostic tools for melanoma are further complicated by the fact that many tissue samples, particularly archival tissue samples are FFPE (formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded) samples. Quantitative assessments of gene expression in FFPE samples are challenging because RNA extracted from FFPE samples exists as fragments less than 300 bases in length.